Description:
Sixteen
projects, their solutions and corresponding WORD files are provided. The
WORD files can be downloaded and assigned to your students. The WORD files
can also be modified. Step by step instructions for using the TI 83 / 84
calculator for list management, calculating probabilities, finding confidence
intervals, and hypothesis testing are included. These projects are
used in both my online and traditional classroom Gen Ed Statistics course.

Many of the projects have an alternate project based
on Tom Clancy's book "Rainbow 6". One of
the subplots is the development of a biological
virus by a group of extreme environmentalists.
Here are a few quotes from the book:

“Humankind was a parasitic species on the
surface of the planet, destroying rather than
nurturing.People have killed off numerous species
of animals and plants and in doing so, people
have forfeited their right to be here.”

“He would start a global
plague that would take lives in numbers far too
great to tally, and in the end would leave alive
only the elect.It would save the planet, but at a
ghastly price.”

"Phase Two would finish
the job begun with the global panic that was
sure to result from Phase One.Four to six weeks
after being injected, the “A” recipients would
start to become ill.…A total of nineteen
weeks, not even a half of a year, not even a
full baseball season, and well over ninety-nine
percent of the people on earth would be dead."

These alternate projects perform statistical analyses on the
development of this deadly biological virus name
the Shiva-Ebola virus.

Note: The reading Tom Clancy's "Rainbow 6" is not a
prerequisite for completing the projects.
There is sufficient information in the project
to perform the statistic analysis required to complete
the project and further the development of the
Shiva-Ebola virus.

4. Project
Probability: Space Shuttle.
When
the space shuttle was launched, the crew had the same chances of
surviving as if they were playing Russian Roulette using a gun having 8
chambers and 1 bullet.

When you select
the episode you want to view by clicking on "VoD", you will be
asked to register with an e-mail address and create a password.
Once you have done this you can view any of the 26 episodes on the
internet. The Space
Shuttle Challenger is episode 16.

Rationale: Probability Distributions
How can the Las Vegas and other casinos make money on their games, video poker, and slot machines? Here
are two projects that demonstrate how that is
possible using probability distributions tables
and expected value.

11a. Project:
Hypothesis Testing, Who Gets the Contract?
Six tire manufacturers submit tires to be tested. Which company
satisfies both the mean and standard deviation specifications of the
bidding and are awarded the the contract for tires for all vehicles of the
Illinois State Police?

11b.
Project:
Hypothesis TestingHypothesis tests are
used to test the validity of claims made about
the mean and standard deviation. Theses
are the same claims made in Project 9b.

BY JIM RITTER, HEALTH REPORTERYou have a greater chance of
dying in the hospital if you are admitted on the weekend, when
fewer doctors and nurses are working researchers have found.
In 23 of the 100 leading causes of death, mortality rates for
patients admitted on weekends were higher than rates patients
admitted during the week, University of Toronto researchers
report. There were no conditions in which death rates were
lower on the weekends. Researchers defined weekends as the
period from midnight Friday to midnight Sunday. Fewer
staffers work then and those who do tend to have less seniority
and experience. Moreover there are fewer supervisors on
weekends and they are often in charge of staffers they don't
know well. Dr. Bell and Dr. Redelmeier of The University
of Toronto report in today's New England Journal of Medicine.
Researchers analyzed 3.8 million admissions from
emergency rooms in Ontario, Canada. They found, for
example, that 42 percent of patients admitted on weekends for
ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysms died compared with 35
percent of patients admitted during the week.
Police and fire departments are fully staffed on
weekends, and hospitals should try to follow the pattern of
these essential services. Hospitals could entice doctors
and nurses by paying more for weekend duty. Hospitals
could save money because it would be more efficient to fully use
expensive equipment seven days a week, Redelmeier said.